


All the Golden Lands

by Skerda



Category: Mortal Instruments Series - Cassandra Clare, Shadowhunter Chronicles - All Media Types, Shadowhunters (TV)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-09-10
Updated: 2016-09-10
Packaged: 2018-08-14 04:05:18
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,067
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7997923
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Skerda/pseuds/Skerda
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Magnus Bane, before he was Magnus Bane. Starving and exhausted, a young boy from the East Indies lies dying in the streets of Madrid...</p>
            </blockquote>





	All the Golden Lands

**Author's Note:**

> Pretty short fic again. Apologies to anyone who speaks Javanese, Malay or Spanish; I speak none of these, so the single words I use from each in this fic come from internet dictionaries. 
> 
> Enjoy!

He was staring at the dust coating his hands when a woman reached down to touch him. He stayed carefully still, keeping his head down and his eyes averted. He couldn’t remember the last time someone had touched him with kindness, the way this lady did. She smelled of oranges, and her voice, when she spoke, was gentle. He couldn’t understand her, couldn’t decipher the fluid language she was speaking and translate it into what _he_ knew. It sounded nothing like the tongue of the Dutch masters of his homeland, or the language he’d learned at his mother’s knee.

It didn’t matter in any case. There was nothing he could say to anyone, not after so many years of solitude. Maybe he’d forgotten how to speak. He’d forgotten a lot of things.

The woman spoke again, more urgently this time. He wished he knew what she was saying. The warm weight of her hand on his shoulder was unfamiliar, but he revelled in it like a parched man come to water. If he could keep her here a little longer, maybe that craving for touch would be fulfilled and it might satisfy him for a while. He clenched his eyes shut, trying desperately to pretend it was the hand of his _ibu_ , the hand that had stroked his hair so many times and had always been so loving, right up until it was not. He tried hard not to remember it, but the sting of his mother’s slap still overpowered the other, kinder memories. It was the last time she’d touched him; she’d been so careful not to, after that.

The lady’s fingers inched towards his chin. Still adrift in his own unhappy thoughts, he didn’t notice in time. She caught his chin and tilted his face towards her.

He was very, very careful to keep _them_ shut.

_“¿Ciego?”_

Her voice was achingly soft. He didn’t know what she’d said, but he didn’t think it was bad. He tried to recall if anyone he’d met in the past several years had spoken so nicely to him; he didn’t think they had. The traders he met along the old spice route had been harsh and outright cruel. The countryfolk whose land he’d wandered through had been no kinder.

Maybe these people were different.

The thought hadn’t occurred to him before, and rather than give himself time to consider it (as he ought to have done) he gave himself wholly to the idea. Of _course_ they were different. With what he’d seen of the people of this continent, he could expect no less. Everything about them was different. Why not this?

Startled by the hope blooming in his chest, he opened his eyes.

The woman yelped and moved away as if she’d been burnt. Her face was as gentle and motherly as he’d imagined it to be, but the fear in her eyes was something he’d carefully omitted from his imaginings. In his mind, no one screamed and recoiled when they looked at him. He always hoped that someday, if he believed it enough, it might come true.

The lady had stepped away, but surprisingly, she hadn’t run. She lingered a few feet from where he lay sprawled against the hot stone wall at his back. Their eyes locked.

She wasn’t running. She wasn’t running.

Hardly daring to move an inch, he stared unblinkingly at her, trying to convince her to stay. She was so nice to him. Maybe…maybe she would help.

“ _Sila…”_ He didn’t know what he was asking for.

She was startled again by the sound of his voice, rough from disuse and the onset of adolescence. He watched as she inched back, and wondered if she was about to disappear into the throng of people passing by. She’d been the first and only person to see him, curled in the shade of the building doorway between a flight of steps and a basket of market fish.

She was going to leave. He could see it in her face.

Unbidden, tears welled up in his eyes. He turned his face downwards, ashamed to have begun crying again. It seemed all he’d done lately was cry, but he was just so tired of all this. He was tired of being a monster. No one could stand the sight of him.

Before he could calm himself down, he began sobbing aloud. It was quiet, but he knew the woman (if she hadn’t gone already) could probably still hear.

He curled in on himself further, hiding his face in his knees.

He hadn’t eaten in days, hadn’t eaten _properly_ in years. The last gulp of water he’d had had been hours ago. Perhaps if he just lay here for a little longer, Death would take him and he wouldn’t have to suffer like this anymore. He’d surrender to It willingly.

And lay there, he did.

It felt like weeks passing, but beneath the scorching heat of the sun he knew time was playing tricks on him. Thirst and hunger were beginning to make his head spin, so now he kept his eyes shut for fear of making the spinning worse. He decided, dizzily, that he’d open them again just before the end came, so he could have one last glimpse of this beautiful place.

It wouldn’t be a bad thing, to die in a place like this. He just wasn’t meant to be a part of this world. Who was he to resist fate?

 

 

* * *

 

 

 

He was barely conscious when he felt another light touch on his shoulder. Roused from a dreamlike state he hadn’t intended to wake from, he could only squint uselessly at the figure crouched before him. He was almost certain it was Death, come to claim him. It was exactly how he thought it might look: cloaked, pale, with no eyes or mouth. Well, it did have eyes and a mouth, but they were sown shut. Behind Death, there stood the lady. She watched with the gentle expression he’d hoped to see on her face before.

It surprised him, somewhere deep in the back of his mind, that he wasn’t more scared than he was. But he found himself unable to feel much fear; what could Death do to him that Life hadn’t?

“ _Brujo_ ,” Death said. The boy let his eyes slip shut again.

When he reopened them, Death had given him a new name.

_Magnus._

 

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading, and I hope very much that you enjoyed it. Feel free to review or comment!


End file.
